Comms technicians and engineers are continuing to provide lifelines to critical services during the Covid-19 lockdown, like INCOM-CNS technicians Robert, Aiden and Senan pictured on their way to Manchester’s Trafford General Hospital for another day on the NHS comms front line. They risk infection daily to keep the hospital’s ICT infrastructure operational.
“At the Infirmary I have designated key workers assigned on site all the time,” said INCOM-CNS CTO Jason Kilvert.
“All we can do is issue them with guidelines and a Health & Safety Executive document that basically says you have to wash your hands more regularly and follow distancing measures.
"Effectively, they are very much on the front line, but we've just got to try and keep it rolling as best we can.
“I think telecoms channel people will get more respect during this period. Lots of organisations consider IT to be important and the telecoms teams that are making sure hospitals can make telephone calls during this crisis tend to get forgotten about.
"I’ve got lads committed to staying in the hospitals, care homes and health centres we look after for as long as we're saying that's the right thing to do.”
Following Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s lockdown edict, reseller teams across the UK have been working night and day to make sure vital organisations can continue to communicate and companies can carry on working during home isolation.
“Our teams are working 16-hour days over the course of this crazy period and they are doing it all with smiles on their faces, which is most important,” said Chris Morrisey, MD of Leeds-based Lily Comms.
Andrew Skipsey, MD of Hampshire-based M12, said his support teams are ‘full on’ and praised the support he has received from vendor partners.
“Our customer service and engineers have helped hundreds of businesses and thousands of users seamlessly transition to home working and it’s great to see vendors offering the remote options at no cost.”
Kevin Coll, MD at Aberdeen IT service business Solab, underlined the importance of innovative reseller teams working in other crucial UK industries.
“The amazing people in our Onboard Tracker team are helping to ensure safe operations, mobilisations and crew movements for tens of thousands of energy and marine workers on rigs, vessels and helicopters worldwide," he said.
"Business continuity is in our DNA and the Covid-19 pandemic will not change that.”